Dragon Kin

05

Alicja

My people, insulated from the population, didn't have the Yat accent, even though we lived inside of its heart. Our community peppered the area of the South Seventh Ward. This is just north of Maringy, where Bourbon Street was... the area Mardi Gras made famous. The area I never went to because of the crowds and the street scams — the people who say things like, "Mis I bet you a dollar I know where you got those shoes." Don't ever play that game. It might only cost you a dollar, but...

I understood the Yat speak, like everyone in the city, and I could speak it alright. At home though our language was richer and wider than Yat could express.

With my silk scarfs off my head, and no silver wrist bands dangling, I could pass for a local, and not an Enedral. Unless I called my grandmother Oma, instead of Maw Maw. Which happened far more often than I liked to admit. I just wasn't that good of a spy, I guess.

My cousins, Sean and Mal, were never caught. They could slip into the Yat speak or Cajun, or New Yorker, or Boston, with the ease of slipping on new socks. They were skilled with their tongues.

I didn't know what to do now. Obviously Ismael didn't want to talk about it out loud, but he saw something. Something he didn't want to speak about. Which made sense. It was a common belief down here that to speak of something scary was to call the thing to you. Ya'know, like: Speak of the Devil and the Devil will appear. Only down here it was serious advice, which most accepted as serious advice.

He did look like he saw a devil.

I glanced at the woman beside me, and found her looking at me. I adjusted my butt on the seat and smiled. "Is he alrite?"

She studied me for a moment, glanced over at him, then turned back and said, "It don' madda."

"Naw?" I asked.

"Naw. It don' madda, 'cause he fixin to break, like a levee. Gawd help him when he do," she said.

Ash came back with the woman's and Ismael's drinks. She sat them down, gave Ismael a look over. Decided he wasn't going to puke on her bar, and went back down to fill other orders.

Well, that wasn't much help. But I could tell he saw something that frightened him, and maybe that's all I needed to know tonight.

Turning back to my drink I took a sip and then ate some fries. While I did, I found myself believing I found enough out. He saw "it" and didn't want to ever see it again. He wasn't in here drinking, he was hiding.

My teeth suddenly vibrated hard, like before. An electric charge going through my molars — a jangling shudder through them and up my jaw. I gasped out loud and put my hands on my jaw muscles in reflex. Then it faded. Not because of anything I did, I was sure. "Fucking dat?" I whispered.

The woman next to me lifted her eyebrow, "You be gris-gris cher?"

She was asking if there was a spell on me. "Naw, it's not like that. No cunja. Just me ache my Maw Maw fix when I home."

She nodded, and turned back to her drink. That's the way people were down here. They were open to helping, but if you said 'no thanks', no skin off them. They left you to do your doins.

"The fuck it ain't gris-gris!" Ismael snarled, pushing back his stool and standing. "Devil out tonight. Devil in the dark, riding!"

So, yeah, it was time to go.

Out of my peripheral vision, I saw Ash glaring down the bar towards him. Then she looked over to Mack, the barman/bouncer, and nodded in Ismael's direction.

Mack was a large man. Dark black skin, rolling shoulders and narrow waist. Used to be a heavyweight boxer, before everything went MMA. He was a good man, I always felt. I'd watched him work a few times and he was always polite and calm. He knew you weren't going to hurt him. His concern was not hurting you. He didn't want to lose a customer, just wanted you to make it home and sleep it off.

Unfortunately, Ismael didn't want to go. He didn't want to go outside. And I had a feeling that whatever was out there, scared him a lot more than Mack did.

Ismael turned and saw Mack strolling toward him, and Mack in no rush. Ismael, I could see, felt his coming like a torpedo heading in his direction — a clear and present danger at a constant speed with decreasing range.

"No, no no, Mack. Don't you be coming here. I ain't going. No mista. I ain't going to get 'et!"

What? Did he say he wasn't going to be eaten?

Mack stopped, and turned his head to Ash, then looked back at Ismael. "You drinking absinthe again?"

"No, I ain't. I can't go out there Mack. I'll sit here, I'll give you my drink and have coffee. But I swear, you push, I'm pushing back hard."

Mack looked at the floor and everyone was watching now. There were mumbles and hushed questions, but they had the show. Even the music had stopped. In the mirror I saw a few fivers laid on the table, as people made bets.

When he looked up, Mack said, "I no worried about you hurting me. But I's worried about you — Awrite, you sit. Ash give you regula coffee. No more boozing tonight. No more screaming, or out you go. We good?"

"Awrite, be good," Ismael said, and then he sat back down in his chair.

Mack looked over at the DJ and nodded his head. A moment later the music was on. I didn't know the artist for this one, and my head was exploding from the inside.

Then from over by the door, someone hollered, "Need the fire truck. Man be trapped on a roof naked."

What the?

"Who dat?" Mack hollered back.

"Be some naked white boy trapped up there, Mack," the voice called back.

"Where dat? What roof?" Mack asked. But Ash was picking up the house phone and dialing.

"Be the CVS, Mack. He up there hollering for help, and he naked. That's what he hollered. He need help and he bare."

"You no get his name?" Mack asked.

"He a naked white boy, Mack. I got no need for a name."

There was laughter at that, and a general moving in the crowd as people grabbed up cups and phones and started heading for the door. The woman beside me gathered her things with agile darting grabs and left to follow.

Watching them go, I thought: this might be why I was here. Glancing over at Ismael, he still looked miserable, and he wasn't moving. So I picked up my change, dropping three dollars tip, snatched a hand of fries and was about to follow them out the door, when a thought struck me.

Looking over to Ismael I said, "If I was trying to dodge something I didn't want to see tonight, I'd get myself in that crowd — get me down the road a piece and then turn left into a shadow. But, that's a lot of if."

Then I turned away and hurried after the crowd, which were still trying to get through the front door. So I flipped my direction and went out to the back, then out the side gate. Then I ran around to the front again and caught up with some folks.